Page 161 of Kneel Before Me

“Max.” She put her hand on his shoulder. He stiffened immediately at the contact. “I don’t want you to die. Now, or anytime soon. But this wasn’t part of our arrangement.”

“Then tell me why all I want to do right now is kiss you.”

“You can’t.”

“Why not?”

She opened her mouth, then closed it. Her eyes shifted to the dresser again. A horrible feeling twisted his gut.

“Daphne,” he said quietly, her name barely a whisper. “It’s someone else, isn’t it?” He couldn’t bear to say the basilisk’s name.

Her eyes flicked back to his. They narrowed. “Just because I don’t want you means there has to be someone else?”

“So you’re saying I’m right.”

“I’m not saying anything.”

“Yes, you are. Even if you aren’t being straightforward about it. You’re saying fucking plenty, Daphne.” Maximus stepped even closer. “Who is it? Tell me.”

He was going to make her say it. He was going to make her name the thing she probably wasn’t ready to admit even to herself. Maximus was going to win.

When she remained silent, he said, “If you’re going to break my heart, I have a right to know why. It’s him, isn’t it? That snake.”

Rage was rapidly filling him. The horror he’d felt when his father showed him the bloodletting seeped steadily away. Why shouldn’t the snakes suffer? Look what Kronos had done to Daphne: manipulated her, ensnared her with his charms.

Daphne closed her eyes.

Maximus didn’t relent. “You’ll fuck him but not me? A monster?”

“He’s not a—”

“He is a monster,” Maximus nearly screamed it. “And he will hurt you if you let him.”

Daphne opened her eyes. “And what will you do?” she whispered, her tone deathly quiet in comparison to his. “If I let you?”

They stared at each other, silence thickening around them.

Daphne’s face was flushed; the wine was taking effect. She raised a single finger, pointing it at his chest. “You just want to fuck me.”

“Of course I want to fuck you,” Maximus snapped. “I’ve wanted to fuck you since the moment I met you. And you want to fuck me too. But you’re not ready to admit that, are you? You may never be ready.”

“Max,” she began. “You don’t—”

“I don’t what, Daphne? You do not get to tell me how I feel. And you certainly don’t get to pretend you don’t feel the same. I’m tired of this. Aren’t you?”

Daphne shook her head before taking another sizable pull of wine. He couldn’t read her; he never could. But he refused to believe that he was alone in this. She had to feel something—anything—for him. She had to think of him the way he thought of her, as his future. The alternative was unacceptable.

“I told you I couldn’t give you what you seek.”

Maximus remembered it well. Yet he could not believe it. “You didn’t mean that.”

“Yes I did.”

“No,” he insisted. “You didn’t.”

Daphne stepped back. His entire world went with her. “We had an arrangement, Maximus. You’re the one who wanted this.”

Maximus couldn’t comprehend what he was hearing. How dare she do this to him? How dare she string him along, make him fall for her, then deny she felt the same?